Acer Announces $279 C710-2055 Chromebook for Students

It’s not just HP and Lenovo that are targeting the education market with their Google Chromebooks. Today Acer announced the C710-2055 Chromebook, a $279 system running Google’s mostly-online operating system, which it hopes will appeal to students looking for a portable and inexpensive notebook.

The C710 will be powered by 1.1-GHz Intel Celeron 847 processor, and will have 4GB of RAM and a 320GB hard drive. The notebook weighs 3.1 pounds, which includes an 11.6-inch display, three USB 2.0 ports, HDMI, VGA and a 2-in-1 card reader.

The C710 is very similar to the 11.6-inch C7 Chromebook that Acer released last year, in that it has the same processor and hard drive. However, in the press release, Acer says that the C710 will have a 6-cell battery that it claims will provide up to 6 hours of battery life, roughly an hour and a half longer than what we saw with the C7.

While this Chromebook will be available for anyone to purchase, Acer touts its portability and cloud features as beneficial for students, who need something they can carry around easily and collaborate with other students and teachers. The company says the low cost of the system, both to purchase and maintain, will also appeal to IT administrators.